|
| Second wave of Bagle Trojan horse attacks spammed
to millions of email addresses. |
SophosLabs™,
Sophos's global network of virus, spyware and spam analysis
centers, have warned that for the second day running a hacker is
spamming multiple new versions of the Troj/BagleDl-U Trojan
horse to millions of email addresses around the world.
The attacks were spreading across the net between 15:00 and
22:00 (GMT) yesterday, and a new phase began again at approximately
the same time today. All of the different versions of the Trojan
horse attempt to turn off anti-virus and security software, and
block access to security websites, in an attempt to allow hackers
to gain access to infected computers.
The latest series of malicious messages have strong similarities
to yesterday's onslaught: the subject line is blank, the body
message text is 'new price', and the malicious file attached can be
identified with names such as '09_price.zip', 'price_new.zip', and
'price2.zip'.
"This is the second massive email attack phase from this hacker
in two days - the creator is obviously intent on infecting as many
people as possible," said Carole Theriault, senior
security consultant at Sophos. "All computer users should avoid
opening unsolicited email attachments, and ensure that their
anti-virus protection is up to date. Businesses should also
consider blocking all executable code from entering their networks
via email - most companies have no need to receive computer
programs via this route, and it dramatically reduces the risk of
infection".
Sophos is currently protecting its customers against these new
threats.
More than 100 million users in 150 countries rely on Sophos as the best protection against complex threats and data loss. Sophos is committed to providing security and data protection solutions that are simple to manage, deploy and use and that deliver the industry's lowest total cost of ownership. Sophos offers award-winning encryption, endpoint security, web, email, and network access control solutions backed by SophosLabs - a global network of threat intelligence centers. With more than two decades of experience, Sophos is regarded as a leader in security and data protection by top analyst firms and has received many industry awards.
Sophos is headquartered in Boston, US and Oxford, UK. More information is available at www.sophos.com.